How does a social welfare officer know when a parent with mental illness or behavioral symptoms is harmful to the children? As a social you are confronted with different ethical dilemmas on a daily basis. The social welfare officers have to follow their own authorities, laws, guidelines and regulations while at the same time do everything to satisfy their clients’ needs. This inconsistency can sometimes be difficult to handle. The purpose of this study was to gain knowledge and a better understanding of how social welfare officers handles their elbow room in the field of actions to support the children of parents with mental illness. We have conducted a qualitative study where we interviewed six social welfare officers using the “vinjett” method. All social welfare officers included in the study are working with children of parents with mental illness. By using Michael Lipsky’s theory of Street-Level Bureaucrats we intended to get an understanding of how social welfare officers would act in specific situations. Our study shows that social welfare officers’ first contact is with the parents for a judgment of their capacity as parents. The results shows that the social welfare officers, who we interviewed, felt that they had a wide elbow room with resources to determine and shape different actions for the children of parents with mental illness but at the same time they experienced different barriers which may limit the alternatives in their decision-making. The majority of the social welfare officers in our study felt that they were aware of the power and control they possesses, which also are defined in Lipsky’s theory.

<p>How does a social welfare officer know when a parent with mental illness or behavioral symptoms is harmful to the children? As a social you are confronted with different ethical dilemmas on a daily basis. The social welfare officers have to follow their own authorities, laws, guidelines and regulations while at the same time do everything to satisfy their clients’ needs. This inconsistency can sometimes be difficult to handle. The purpose of this study was to gain knowledge and a better understanding of how social welfare officers handles their elbow room in the field of actions to support the children of parents with mental illness. We have conducted a qualitative study where we interviewed six social welfare officers using the “vinjett” method. All social welfare officers included in the study are working with children of parents with mental illness. By using Michael Lipsky’s theory of Street-Level Bureaucrats we intended to get an understanding of how social welfare officers would act in specific situations. Our study shows that social welfare officers’ first contact is with the parents for a judgment of their capacity as parents. The results shows that the social welfare officers, who we interviewed, felt that they had a wide elbow room with resources to determine and shape different actions for the children of parents with mental illness but at the same time they experienced different barriers which may limit the alternatives in their decision-making. The majority of the social welfare officers in our study felt that they were aware of the power and control they possesses, which also are defined in Lipsky’s theory.</p>

A sample of 208 nurses (a response rate of 63%) participated in a study by responding to a questionnaire comprising of 170 items which examined nurses’ attitudes towards mental illness, and the association between contact, cultural values, general and practice stigma. General stigma refers to attitudes towards the mentally ill while practice stigma is informed from differential clinical practice approaches towards the care of two case vignettes describing a patient with mental illness and one with diabetes. Subjects were recruited using the snowballing technique and comprised of nurses (83 Anglo Psychiatric, 41 Anglo General, 49 Chinese Psychiatric and 35 Chinese General) currently practising in Victoria. Age ranged from 21 to 65 years. Principal components analyses were conducted on items to develop subscales related to individualism and collectivism, contact types, general and practice stigma. Analyses of variance and covariance were conducted to examine differences between nurse type and ethnicity and respectively, to account for possible differences in background, contact and in the case of practice stigma, general stigma. / The key findings revealed differences according to nurse type and ethnicity in several of the subscales. Psychiatric nurses endorsed a higher level of contact than general nurses with mentally ill people on the variables ‘Contact Through Work Situation’, ‘Patient Help Nurses’ and ‘External Socialisation with Patient’, but not on the variable ‘Relative With Mental Illness’. By virtue of more contact, psychiatric nurses also endorsed less general stigma than general nurses, assessed by results from analysing social distancing, but not by negative stereotyping of people with mental illness. With respect to practice stigma, while care and satisfaction did not differ according to patient type and nurse type, psychiatric nurses expressed less authoritarianism and negativity than general nurses towards the mental illness case than general nurses while lesser differences between nurse types were evident for the diabetes case. Chinese nurses when compared with Anglo-Australian nurses, endorsed more highly collectivist values measured by the variables ‘Ingroup Interdependence’ and ‘Ingroup Role Concern’ but there was no difference in individualist values. This may reflect acculturation towards Western values but also retention of Chinese values, interpreted in the light of other results on cultural affiliation, as a bicultural position. Chinese nurses endorsed more highly general stigma towards the mentally ill than Anglo nurses when statistically controlling for differences in background demographics and contact factors. / Nursing satisfaction did not differ in ethnicity and patient type. Chinese nurses endorsed more highly care and authoritarianism in their clinical practice approaches than Anglo-Australian nurses, although there was no significant interaction effect between ethnicity and patient type on care and authoritarianism. Chinese nurses endorsed more highly negativity than Anglo-Australian nurses for the mental illness case than the diabetes case, an effect later shown to be mediated by differences in general stigma between the two ethnic groups. Within the Chinese sample, higher contact was associated with lower differential negativity for the mental illness than the diabetes case. Several path analyses suggested Chinese values influenced differential negativity, mediated by general stigma and prior diversified contact with people having a mental illness. / It may be concluded from these results that practice stigma is related to cultural values but the relationship is mediated by general stigma and contact. What aspect of the Chinese values specifically correlates with general stigma remains a question for further research, but several possibilities are discussed.

Thesis (M.S.W.) - Carleton University, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 117-125). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.

Revised thesis (Ph.D.)--Cambridge University, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 153-164) and index.

This study was designed to assess the reliability of the "Psychological Rating Scale for Diagnostic classification as an instrument for determining diagnoses consistent with DSM-III criteria and nomenclature. Pairs of raters jointly interviewed a total of 50 hospital patients and then independently completed the 70-item rating scale to arrive at Axis I and Axis II diagnoses which were subsequently correlated with diagnoses obtained by standard psychometric methods, interrater agreement was 88 per cent for Axis I and 62 per cent for Axis II, with correlations of .94 and .79 respectively.

Researchers have extensively studied the experiences and potential consequences of being a child whose parent has a mental illness (COPMI). However, there is no consensus on the best way to support these children, in general or in schools. The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the effects of parental mental illness on children by using an ecological approach. Researchers have used ecological theory to illustrate the importance of internal characteristics, skills, and supports for children to enhance resiliency. This study looked at whether COPMI differed significantly from the children of parents of parents with no current or past mental illness (NonCOPMI) on the Developmental Assets Profile (DAP). The study also looked at whether there was a significant difference in the change in DAP scores for the COPMI compared to the NonCOPMI over time. A secondary data analysis of DAP survey results was performed and SPSS v.23.0 (IBM, 2015) software was used to complete one-way and two-way repeated measures ANOVA on DAP scores. COPMI reported lower DAP levels than NonCOPMI, and this difference was statistically significant in some areas of Internal Assets and Social and Community contexts. These findings suggest that COPMI may be challenged in these areas and are in line with previous findings regarding the challenges that COPMI may face and supports the continued use of ecological theory. By utilizing the DAP survey, specific areas where COPMI may benefit from additional supports can help professionals promote resilience among children. Proactive efforts like this, especially in schools, where increasing attention is being paid to mental health education, may contribute to positive social change.

No description available.

Negative attitudes and stigma associated with mental illness have a profound impact on individuals who experience them. Researchers have defined stigma as the attribution of a deviant characteristic to members of a particular group. Persons with severe and persistent mental illness (SPMI) face many difficulties that impact their full participation in social life. Although attitudinal reactions to individuals with SPMI have improved considerably over the last few decades, there are still areas for improvement. Limited research has been conducted to evaluate attitudes and stigma associated with individuals with SPMI among human service professionals-in-training (HSPs). For this study HSPs were defined as individuals entering into social service, mental health, and substance abuse professions. Further, there have only been a few published studies in attitude research that utilized randomized vignettes portraying individuals with two different mental health diagnoses. Data collection occurred in counselor education and similar programs at many universities. A total of 79 participants (20 males and 58 females) took part in this study. Recruitment efforts reached HSPs at 27 universities throughout the contiguous United States. For this study, participants were asked to respond to self-report surveys and to one of two written vignettes to quantify their attitudes toward the individuals depicted in them. The two vignettes described an individual with a mental illness and differed in the diagnosis attributed to the individual: schizophrenia spectrum disorder in one vignette and generalized anxiety disorder in the other vignette. Results indicated that although there were slight mean differences between the two groups of participants, the differences were not statically significant, t (77) = 0.63, p =53. The Attribution Questionnaire-27 (AQ-27; Corrigan, 2012) gathered overall attitudes towards mental illness. The Mental Health Provider Stigma Inventory (MHPSI; Kennedy, Abell, & Mennicke, 2014) was used to collect data on attitudes, behaviors, and social pressure impacting stigma towards individuals who have SPMI. Data collected with these two scales yielded evidence to indicate that participants held stigmatizing attitudes towards individuals with SPMI. Data gathered suggested that graduate students in rehabilitation counselor education programs expressed fewer stigmatizing attitudes than students from other programs. This result was seen across both measures. Data were collected on frequency of contact with persons with mental illness to evaluate the association between contact frequency and knowledge of mental illness and negative attitudes. Demographic data gathered included gender, age, professional training, and number of years of work experience in a counseling-related role. Further, a hierarchical multiple regression was used to determine which order of predictors were statistically significant to the outcome measure. Prior literature suggest that prior contact and familiarity scores playing a more important role in predicting the outcome variable (AQ-27) then the demographic information. The first model was statistically significant F(6,72) =3.64, p= .003 and explained 23% of the variance in the dependent variable (AQ-27 total scores). After the input of these demographic factors the second step included LOF and SADP- PCF-R scores. After entry of the second step the overall variance was 28%. The second model was statically significant F(8,70) = 3.39 p = 002 and explained an additional 4% variance in the model. In the final adjusted model, four out of the seven predictor variables were statistically significant. A small pilot study consisting of rehabilitation counseling professionals was used to develop the methodologies for this study. The primary limitation of the primary study was the sample size. Further details of the methodology used and limitations of this particular study will be described in subsequent chapters. Implications of this study and suggested future research are proposed.

Perceptions can be influenced by the media concerning different groups of people. As a result of the importance of the media in how individuals obtain information and formulate opinions, how different groups are presented whether negatively or positively is important. This research examines the portrayal of mental illness in films and the impact that such portrayals have on the perceptions of mental illness of the viewers. Mental illness representations can be found quite prevalently among film and the way in which it is represented can be important as to how populations perceive those with mental disorders. This thesis looks to explore perceptions of mental illness and beliefs from those who have viewed films that portray characters with mental disorders. Through the use of an online survey, one hundred and ninety five participants provided data for this study. Based on previous research, it was hypothesized that individuals who had seen more films portraying mental illness would have more knowledge and sympathy regarding mental illness compared those who had seen less films portraying mental illness. It was also hypothesized that social stereotypes surrounding mental disorders would be present in the knowledge that individuals had more so than factual data about mental disorders. Women were predicted to express more sympathy than men. A statistical analysis program was used to analyze the resulting data including the use of correlations and t-tests. Evidence indicated that the amount of films viewed portraying mental illness did not have an impact on knowledge or sympathy regarding mental illness. Perceptions of mental illness are still a relevant topic and the awareness of facts surrounding mental disorders should continue to be spread.